Texts for Phonetics Practice

How I became a writer

Throughout my childhood I wanted to be writer when I grew up but I lacked confidence in
myself. I knew I had the technical ability and even the approval and encouragement of my
parents but I was afraid that I had a serious weakness that would be difficult to overcome, not
enough imagination. What changed everything was my first meeting with Eric. I had always
had a great admiration for his novels, and the advice he gave me that day, at the beginning of
my writing career, was of great importance. He just said: ‘Think of the characters and then let
them tell the story.’

Selling our house

I have just put our house on sale because we are moving out of the neighbourhood and going
to live elsewhere. We have put an advertisement in the local newspaper and hope that we will
be lucky enough to sell it quickly. The house is a new building and so the maintenance costs
are not very high, and it has plenty of storage space, which many people look for these days.
The only disadvantage is that people are short of money and this lessens our chance of selling
quickly. The agent’s recommendation is to accept the first reasonable offer we get.

Moving to the country

I have spent most of my life in cities so I’m still not sure if I made the right decision in moving
to the village. The people are friendly enough but I find the lack of entertainment a little
boring. The only activities here are the ones you expect to find in a typical farming community
—agricultural shows and so on. Still, I breathe the fresh air, and a friend has just opened a gift
shop in a small town not far away. I already do my shopping there and if I see her quite often I
may be able to enjoy the mixture if town and country.